154: Married to a Murderer: Narcissistic Creep Marries a 19 Year Old Girl Then She Disappears
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What would you say to Stacy, your fourth wife? Come home. Stacy loves male attention. She could be... Ran off with a guy? Ran off with a guy and she could be dancing somewhere. I don't know.

Hey, true crime besties. Welcome back to an all new episode of Serialistly. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to an all new episode of Serialistly with me, Annie Elise.

I hope you guys are having a good start to your week. I feel like this case is going to upset you, but I want to just give a little bit of a warning here. I feel like my new Tumblr, which I have right next to me, the one that says, "Be nice, don't kill people." It's brand new merch. You can get it at AnnieElise.com. I feel like it really sets the tone for today's case. I mean, let's be honest, it sets the tone for every case we talk about pretty much, but definitely in today's case.

Now, I originally talked about this case a few weeks back on one of my Thursday recap episodes, and there was an update in the case, which is why we talked about it. And I asked you guys to, on a poll, vote if you wanted me to do a deep dive on this case, because it's a little bit of an older one, not super old, but back in the early 2000s or earlier 2000s, I should say.

And it's a very, very complex case. And while I thought so many people knew about it, apparently a lot of people don't. And even those who are familiar with it didn't really know all of the nuances involved in the case. And when I say it's complex, guys,

Holy crap, it is very complex. So we are going to be together for a minute today, and we are going to unpack everything Drew Peterson. Not to be confused with Scott Peterson, Drew Peterson. So as I mentioned, this case takes us back to 2007. Specifically, it takes us back to the morning of October 29th, 2007.

That's when a woman named Cassandra Kales went to the Illinois State Police to report her sister, 23-year-old Stacey Peterson, as missing. Now Cassandra and other friends of Stacey's had been trying to reach Stacey all day the day prior because Stacey didn't show up when she was supposed to help her sister paint the house.

but nobody had any success in actually reaching Stacey. Now this was very weird because Cassandra and Stacey, they were super close. They talked all the time and Stacey would never just go off the radar like that.

And on top of that, Stacey had told Cassandra that she was going to call her when she woke up that morning, which obviously never happened. But despite all of the red flags and everybody knowing something was wrong, I mean, Stacey was still missing, so now they just needed to find her. But finding her was going to prove to be far harder than anybody could have expected.

So as police began digging into this case, they started building a timeline of sorts, a timeline around what had happened. And as things progressed, they began to look stranger and stranger. Now at first, when Cassandra couldn't get a hold of Stacey, she had called Stacey's husband, Drew. And Drew said that he had last seen Stacey that morning. He had seen her when he just returned home that morning from a shift as a local police officer in the Chicago area.

So as far as everybody was concerned, he was the last person to have physically laid eyes on her. But who was Stacey's husband? Who was Drew? And that's really what everybody was trying to figure out in this moment. And the rabbit hole that this was about to take people down was nothing that anybody had ever expected.

Stacey and Drew had gotten married three years prior, back in 2004, when Stacey was just 19 years old and Drew was 49 years old. And yes, if you have never heard of this case, guys, you're probably wondering if I'm making a mistake on the age gap. But no, they were 30 years apart. Now, as I'm sure you can imagine, Drew's history, I mean, it spans very far back because he is 30 years older than Stacey.

After graduating high school, Drew married his first wife. He married his high school sweetheart, Carol, and this was in 1974.

He also joined the army, where he served two years before then getting a job as a patrol officer for the Bolingbrook Police Department. And he was a really good police officer. So good, actually, that he was promoted from just a patrol officer to then working undercover in the narcotics department. So by all accounts, his life seemed like it was going great, right? He had this great career, a beautiful wife, and the two of them even had two little boys together named Stephen and Eric.

But, as we all know, just because it looks great on the outside, it doesn't mean that it actually is going great on the inside. So six years later in 1980, Carol ended up filing for divorce when she found out that Drew had been having an affair.

Two years after that, after that divorce, Drew got married again to his second wife, and this was a woman named Vicki Connelly. But this, too, did not last, and this wasn't a forever kind of fairy tale. Because you know the saying, once a cheater, always a cheater. And it seems like that was the case with Drew. Because ten years after marrying Vicki, Vicki also ended up leaving Drew after he had yet another affair.

And then, not too long after that, you guessed it, he got married for a third time. Now this time, he got married to the woman that he was having the affair with, and her name was Kathleen Savio. So maybe Drew was finally having his happy ending. He had an affair, but he was in love with this woman, and Kathleen and Drew had two little boys together, so it seemed like maybe they were going to be in it for the long haul. And once again, it all seemed like it was going well. That is, until it wasn't.

They were married for over a decade, but then they ultimately got divorced in 2003, which let me just ask you, do you have any guesses on maybe why they got divorced? Because if you guessed cheating again, you would be correct. And this time, the woman that he was cheating on Kathleen with was none other than the teenager at the time, Stacey. Yes, teenager. Now,

Now, Stacey, Stacey was from a pretty rough background growing up. She was born in 1984, which, to put that in perspective for you, Drew was already on his second marriage by that point, and his two oldest children were older than Stacey. Anyways, Stacey had five siblings. She had four sisters and a brother. But like I said, her childhood was anything but easy.

Six weeks before Stacey was born, her family's house went up in flames and her older sister, Jessica, passed away from the fire. COVID-19 and flu viruses disguise themselves to fool your immune system. That's why COVID-19 and flu vaccines are updated to protect you. Stay up to date on COVID-19 and flu vaccinations. Sponsored by Champions for Vaccine Education, Equity and Progress.

COVID-19 viruses like me change to fool your immune system and make you sick. But updated vaccines help protect you. Stay up to date on COVID-19 and flu vaccinations. Sponsored by Champions for Vaccine Education, Equity and Progress.

So the loss of a child, along with the same time of the birth of another so soon after, was really difficult for her parents. Her parents also had some pretty big knock-down, drag-out fights, and it seemed like her dad Anthony held a lot of resentment towards her mom Christy for not getting her sister Jessica out of the house before it was engulfed in flames.

Her body had been found behind the couch, and it seemed like she had actually gone there to hide from the fire. Just absolutely horrifying and devastating. And apparently, Stacey's dad had even taken his anger a step further, and he had waved a gun in her mom's face during at least one of the many arguments that they had. So obviously, it's pretty easy to tell that from everything I just explained that her parents were definitely struggling.

But as if that wasn't enough, when Stacey was just three years old, her younger sister Lacey died of SIDS. So losing two children now, it was just incredibly difficult for her parents, and they pretty much went off the rails at that point.

Now, at that point, her parents kind of just gave up on parenting. Neighbors would often find Stacey, who was just a toddler at the time, outside. She would be running around completely naked besides a diaper, and it would be in the dead of winter. It also wasn't uncommon for her mom, Kristy, to be just kind of spacing out or sleeping on the couch during the day, just super deep in her grief, all while the kids were running around all over the neighborhood without any sort of parental guidance.

And then over time, as you can imagine, things went from bad to worse. Her mom struggled with a lot of mental health issues, also with drinking. She would often end up just leaving for periods of time and even went on to have multiple stints in different psych wards. She also had a few run-ins with the police for things like stealing alcohol, stealing cigarettes, and even a DUI. Eventually, her mom ended up leaving the family completely.

So Stacey's dad ended up filing for divorce, and after several no-shows by her mom for all of these various court hearings, he ended up getting custody of all of the kids, including Stacey's sister Tina, who was Christy's daughter but not biologically the father's daughter. Now, even though Stacey's dad was given custody of the kids, he was far from an ideal parental figure in their lives. I mean, not by any stretch.

Ever since little Lacey had passed, he also struggled with alcohol. And after the divorce, he too went from bad to worse. Then one day, while Stacey was a teenager, her mom just completely vanished. I mean, she was already pretty removed from their lives, but I'm talking she just vanished completely, never to be seen again.

Her and her sisters truly believed that their mom had actually been murdered by a man that she was living with. Her mom, Christy, was last seen walking at 4:30 in the afternoon. And according to the man that she had lived with, she had apparently left the house to go walk to church, but she had left her purse behind. Things weren't really adding up. And Stacey and her sisters really felt like their mom would never do that. And they were convinced that this man had killed their mom.

But even though Stacey and her sisters were begging for help, the police really didn't seem interested in picking up the case and figuring out what happened to Christy. They kind of just let it go. But despite all of that chaos that Stacey had grown up in and the heartbreak of losing her sisters, her mom, everybody, she was really determined to break that cycle.

More than anything, she wanted to grow up, she wanted to be a nurse, she wanted to have a nuclear family situation where she could raise children alongside a husband. And she was well on her way to a very bright future. She graduated early at 16 years old, and she got a job at a local hotel so she could make money to pay for school. And at that local hotel, that's where she met Drew Peterson.

Drew would come in during his shifts as a police officer. He would do security checks on the hotel just to make sure that everything was all right, that everybody was safe. And then one day when he walked in, he met Stacy.

Now, when Drew and Stacey met, Stacey immediately gravitated toward him. Like I said, he was 30 years older than her, and for her, he was kind of like this father figure that she had always wanted, had always yearned for. He was successful, he was a police officer, which meant that he could protect her, and he offered to provide for her. He even gave her a nice, fully furnished apartment. It was almost irresistible for her to turn away. She couldn't do it. He seemed like the perfect package.

So, the two of them started an affair, something that was obviously very familiar to Drew, and they kept their relationship a secret in the beginning, likely for a mixture of reasons, not only because he was having an affair, but also this huge age gap. Stacey told her family that Drew was just a friend.

But like I said, he was still married to Kathleen. She was also significantly underage. So, I mean, obviously it's not the best look to tell everybody that you're dating an underage girl when you're a cop and you're a married man. It's also not great to say that you are a young girl having an affair with a man who's 30 years older than you. So they kept everything on the down-low for a while. But then one day, Drew's wife Kathleen received a letter in the mail. And this is what the letter said: "Kathy.

This letter is being sent to you for your benefit. At this point in time, you are probably aware that your husband is having an affair. The girl's name, and she is just that, a girl, is Stacey Yelton, born on July 17, 1984, and she resides at 511 Preston, Apartment 129, Bowling Brook, Illinois. Now, you may already have all of this information, but if not, you will need it to prevent any further embarrassment and disgrace to you and your family.

This affair has been going on for several months, and several people have been aware of this situation. Because of her age, 17, and the fact that she is an employee of the village, and because Drew's age and his occupation, he holds a position of authority over her. Drew could be charged criminally for his intimate involvement with this minor. Village officials, the mayor, the trustees, and everyone at the police department have complete knowledge of this situation. It has been an ongoing joke within the department.

The issue has been discussed and has been decided to conceal his behavior to protect the village and Drew. Because of his political alliances with Roger Klar and Ken Each, they are protecting themselves from the embarrassment and the liability. The real victims, being you and your family, should be the ones being protected from this embarrassment.

This is not the first time in the past year that Drew's immoral and unethical behavior has been concealed. This past summer, Drew allowed the beating of an arrestee who was handcuffed and defenseless. The past fall, Drew was suspected to have planted narcotics, cocaine, on two separate drug raids, all to obtain a substantial arrest, all to overshadow his recent behavior and, now, his illegal intimate relationship with a minor.

Drew has been willing to sacrifice his integrity for his personal gain, with total disregard that his actions will embarrass and disrespect his wife and children. Beware whom you talk to within the village administration and within the police department. Example, the mayor, the chief, deputy chief, etc. Protect yourself and your family.

So, I mean, after receiving this letter, Kathleen was shook. She immediately filed for divorce shortly after. And things got extremely, extremely heated with Drew because she didn't just want a divorce. She also wanted the house and half of Drew's pension. Things got so heated, as a matter of fact, that there were 18 domestic-related calls to the police from their house during all of these divorce proceedings. I mean, it was definitely a toxic environment.

Kathleen was calling the police on Drew. She was claiming that she felt unsafe, that he was being extremely abusive towards her. It was just this continuous cycle. She also filed an order of protection, which he often broke. And it really seemed like Drew's status with the police department and him also being good buddies with other officers was really allowing him to get away with a lot more than the average person would.

And get this, at least one point during the divorce, Kathleen was upstairs with her two little boys, while Drew was downstairs with Stacey, with the woman he was having an affair with, the teenager he was having an affair with. It honestly was just a super douche canoe move.

It seemed like Drew put Stacey in the middle of everything as well, and kind of used her to be this total asshole to Kathleen. And she was young, she was impressionable, not to say that that's an excuse, but he really was pitting her against his wife, the one that he was cheating on. So obviously by this point, Drew and Stacey's relationship, I mean, it wasn't really a secret anymore.

And based on that letter that Kathleen had received anonymously, it doesn't really seem like it ever was a secret, at least to some people. Then, in mid-2003, before the divorce between Kathleen and Drew was even final, Stacey gave birth to a little boy.

She and Drew named this little boy Anthony after Stacey's father, but it was a huge slap in the face. He was still married. But then finally, luckily I guess, despite the major back and forth and very volatile divorce, Kathleen and Drew finalized their divorce at the beginning of October.

and then shortly after the divorce was finalized, Drew and Stacey got married. And by shortly, guys, I mean literally it was about a week later. As soon as it was finalized, Drew and Stacey got married, and that made Stacey Drew's fourth wife. But just because the divorce was final, and now Stacey and Drew were getting their happily ever after, it was anything but.

And everything was going to get a lot more complicated, a lot more messy, and way more sinister. And we are going to get to all of that as soon as we have a quick word from today's sponsors. COVID-19 viruses like me change to fool your immune system and make you sick. But updated vaccines help protect you. Stay up to date on COVID-19 and flu vaccinations. Sponsored by Champions for Vaccine Education, Equity, and Progress.

Okay, so now Kathleen and Drew, they are officially divorced, right? Stacey and Drew are married, they have their new bundle of joy together, and all things should be happy, right? Well, one big problem. See, Drew and Kathleen still hadn't worked out all of the financial details regarding the divorce. But Kathleen was willing to let the divorce be finalized while working everything else out, all so that Drew could get married to Stacey and, you know, be out of her hair. Now, as I mentioned, by then, Stacey was still just 19 years old, but she now had an infant.

They also had a little house down the street from Kathleen that she and Drew lived in.

Their custody schedule and their arrangement was that Drew would get the weekends with the kids, while Kathleen had the kids during the week. So everything was moving along as usual during the last weekend of February in 2004. Drew and Stacey had all of the kids all weekend, and then they were set to take them back to Kathleen's house on Sunday. It was a very routine setup. They always did this week to week. But there was something different this time.

This time, when Drew went to take the kids home, nobody answered the door. He had to go to work, though. He had to make his shift as the police officer, so he took the kids back to Stacy's house, and he just figured that he would go back over to Kathleen's later on and drop them off.

He figured maybe Kathleen had gone out, maybe she was running errands, maybe she was out seeing friends, something like that. Well, when he went back later that night to drop the kids off, he still couldn't reach Kathleen. And then the next day was going to be Monday. The kids were supposed to be with her all during the week. So he tried to reach her all day, but he still couldn't.

So that's when he called Kathleen's best friend, Mary, who was also her neighbor, and he asked Mary to go over to the house to go look inside for her. Now, the reason he asked Mary to go inside the house and he didn't go himself is because Drew was concerned about going into the house by himself, because he knew that Kathleen wouldn't want him in the house, she wouldn't want him in her space, especially given their current relationship.

So Mary went over to the house with her husband, with her son as well, and with another neighbor. A locksmith came and opened the door, and the four of them went in, while Drew just stood by at the door, in the doorframe. Mary and the other neighbor were doing the upstairs sweep, while her husband and her son were doing a downstairs sweep.

And it wasn't long until absolute screeching horrible screams came from upstairs. And once Drew heard these screams, he immediately ran up there. When he got up the stairs, Kathleen was lying on her side in her bathtub with no pulse.

She had a gash to her head, her hair was soaked with blood, but besides all of that, her body and the tub was completely dry. The police were immediately called and showed up on the scene, but since Drew was a police officer in Bolingbrook, the Illinois State Police took over the investigation. They interviewed both Drew and Stacey, and their stories matched. They had been taking care of the kids, and they weren't at Kathleen's house.

And then, after the police went through all of the information, ultimately, a coroner's jury convened, and they ruled her death as an accidental drowning. They believed that she had slipped in the tub, and that that's what led to her death, and the reason why the tub was just completely bone dry was because the water had slowly drained while she laid there, because she had been there for so long. But they said, no foul play, it was an accidental drowning, and that's what happened. After

After Kathleen passed away, Drew and Stacy took full custody of Drew and Kathleen's two little boys, and Stacy ended up adopting both of them. Then, just a few months later, Stacy gave birth to another child, this time a baby girl that she named Lacey after her baby sister. Now obviously going from having one kid full-time to four children full-time, all within months, I mean, that's a lot for anybody.

But remember, Stacey, Stacey had always wanted to be a mom. It was her dream. And she was so, so happy to finally be living it. It's no doubt that there were some issues, of course. I mean, but overall, from the outside looking in, she really seemed to be happy. And she loved Drew's boys as if they were her own. And remember, she adopted them too.

And this is really why when Stacey went missing, everybody was just completely confused. She was happy. She had so much to live for. She loved her children. She would never abandon them. So people in her community started searching absolutely everywhere for her. They gathered in groups. They put flyers up. Everybody was trying to find Stacey. Well, everybody, but one person. Because throughout all of it, there was one person who just didn't seem very concerned.

And that was Drew. Drew told the police and Stacey's family that Stacey had called him from the airport saying that she had left him for another man. Now, her car was actually at the airport, but according to Drew, all that was missing was her bikini, a passport, and a little bit of cash.

Which that didn't make sense to anybody in the community. Nobody was buying it, and everybody was becoming skeptical of Drew. I mean, why would Stacey leave with another man and a bikini and a passport when she had everything that she ever wanted? She had kids, a family. It made absolutely no sense to anybody. Also, not for nothing, but if she was leaving to go be with a new man and like start this new life, why would she only take a bikini? Why wouldn't she take more clothing with her? It just was not adding up.

And to top it all off, as everybody was looking into this, investigating this, looking for Stacey, people were hearing about Kathleen's death.

This was because a reporter who had first reported on her death brought it back into the spotlight when Stacey went missing, saying, no, no, no, no, no, he already had one wife. She died. Now his other wife is missing? What's going on here? An ex-wife dead after a very high-conflict divorce and now a current wife missing? And honestly, that's enough to make just about anybody suspicious.

So three days after Stacey went missing, the police executed a search warrant. They searched Stacey and Drew's house, both of their cars, and they took computers, they took all of Drew's firearms, which was 11 in total. And the whole reason for the search warrant and why it came is because police had initially tried to search everything, and Drew only let them search one of the cars. He was definitely not being forthcoming.

So that same day, the same day of the warrant, police also announced that they were looking into the records of Kathleen's death. Then, about a week after that, police named Drew as the prime suspect in Stacey's disappearance. Some in the community voiced their suspicions that Peterson was involved. She did say to many of us, not just me in confidence, but many of us, that if anything happened to her, it was not an accident, he killed her. Drew

Peterson steadfastly maintained that Stacy, his fourth wife, ran off, but police doubted his story. I would say that right now, Drew Peterson has gone from a person of interest to clearly being a suspect. And it was going from bad to worse for Drew.

Because shortly after that, they announced that they were going to be exhuming Kathleen's body so that they could investigate her death. Savio was found dead in a bathtub in the couple's home in 2004. Her death, first ruled an accident, was recently ruled a homicide after her body was exhumed.

And what's really odd is with all of this, with all the public scrutiny and people looking at Drew, asking him, "Where's Stacy? What's the truth about Kathleen?" The search warrant, Kathleen's body being exhumed, you would think that Drew would be a little bit spooked, right? Maybe he would kind of go into hiding, maybe he wouldn't be super forthcoming, definitely not doing interviews. Drew, you're a bright guy. You begin to think that the public might say that if it looks like a duck and it acts like a duck, it might be a duck.

Right, but they're not getting all the duck's information. So when they get all the information, then maybe we can reexamine that. All right, let's straighten it out. The third wife. Okay. What happened? Don't know. I don't know. We got information that she drowned in the bathtub. I was working. I was the watch commander at the police department. And the previous night, I believe it was, she...

failed to respond at the door to allow me to bring the children home. The children were with me for the weekend. That was unusual for her, so I started calling her on the phone and I started questioning with the neighbors and they were also alerted because it was unusual for her.

I had neighbors go into the house and they found her dead in the bathtub. Were you surprised when the body was exhumed and they changed the determination of death? Very much surprised, for sure. Because for many years, my children and I, we've been believing that she died in a household accident.

But he was very much in the public eye. It's almost as though he thrived off of it. He loved being on camera. He would open his garage door and rev his motorcycle really loud to get all the reporters that were lined up on the block looking at him, and then he would speed off. It was almost as though he thought he had some sort of celebrity status now, and he was egging the reporters on. It was very, very bizarre. And as all of this was unraveling, more and more was coming out.

Both the police and the public were learning new things constantly. And some of those things were exactly what led police to naming him as a suspect in the first place. First off, Stacey's family shared that things actually were not so good with Drew. They were not as good as Drew led them to believe. Drew made it seem like Stacey was the one with these issues, and that she was leaving him for another man, but that was definitely not the case. In

In fact, as it turned out, Stacey had told Drew just two days before she went missing that she wanted a divorce. And she had told her sister, Cassandra, all about the issues that they had been having. She said that Drew was extremely controlling over her. She said that she genuinely feared for her life with him. And Cassandra apparently told the police that Drew told her, quote, "...I will not let her divorce me."

referring to stacy of course stacy had even gone as far as whispering to cassandra that if anything ever were to have happened to her it was drew now the reason that she had whispered this to her sister this harrowing confession almost foreshadowing her going missing was because she was worried that her own house had been bugged and that drew was listening in on all of her conversations that apparently that's how controlling this man was

that he wouldn't let her leave the house without him, he wouldn't let her go grocery shopping without him, he wouldn't let her do anything. And on top of that, she suspected that he was listening in to all of her phone calls, the house, any sort of movements that she made.

And Stacy's family wasn't the only one who had stories of his controlling behavior. It seemed like the controlling behavior was a theme throughout all of his previous marriages. His first wife claimed that he wasn't ever physically abusive towards her, but he was very controlling over her. And his second wife, Vicky, she was a whole other story.

Vicky had a daughter named Lisa from a previous marriage, and it seemed like Drew was very, very set on Lisa calling him dad. And as Vicky and Drew got closer, he began to get more possessive and more controlling, and he wouldn't even allow Lisa's father inside their home. I mean, it was very bizarre.

On top of that, he was physically abusive, according to Vicky. Now, apparently, the abuse was never so severe or so hard, I should say, not severe, but so hard where it left marks on her. But Vicky says that apparently Drew told her he knew how to kill her and he knew how to make it look like an accident.

So now you're starting to see this pattern. You're starting to get these confessions from the ex-wives, the ones who are still alive, mind you, saying that there is a history of controlling behavior, a history of abuse. Then there was the third wife, Kathleen, who we know is no longer alive.

Now, although she wasn't there to share her side, her family certainly was. They were very vocal about how abusive Drew had been to Kathleen. And on top of that, as it turns out, besides those 18 police calls that Kathleen had made, Kathleen had tried to get help in any other way that she could so that she could get Drew to leave her alone. But it seems like she had just been completely ignored. See, back in November of 2002, she actually wrote a note to the Attorney General's office

This was after trying to call three different times but not reaching anyone. Now the letter is long, but I want to share it with you because it really seems to paint a picture of their relationship from Kathleen's perspective. So I want to share some parts of this letter with you.

Ms. Fraggle, on three different occasions, I have tried to reach you over the phone regarding charges I filed against Drew Peterson on the date of July 5th, 2002. I did contact the police department and talk to the assistant chief, Mike Calcagno, all in reference to Drew breaking in that same weekend. Then I filed a report in regards to my safety from Drew by two officers that arrived at my residence.

When I found out Mr. Peterson was having an affair with a minor at the police department, he began to get very violent by striking me with his hand and chasing me through the house with a police stick.

At that time, on record, I had to get an order of protection from him. There have been several times throughout my marriage with this man where I ended up at the emergency room in Bolingbroke for injuries, and I have reported this only to have the police then leave my home without filing any reports. On July 5th, Mr. Peterson got into my home with a garage door opener that he programmed for himself, all while I was out of town with my sons. I was unaware of his presence, and I was very afraid for my life.

This man popped up from our living room while I was walking downstairs with a basket of laundry. I was shocked, and I dropped all of the clothes and just stood there, asking him to get out. Drew was in uniform, with his police radio in his ear, and he yelled at me to sit down and be quiet. I refused, and he pushed me on the stairs. He told me to move down to the third step and not to move or to speak.

He was very angry that in our divorce the judge ruled that he would have to pay me child support. He told me that he didn't want to pay me anything. He left my boys and I, 8 and 9 years old, with many bills, up to $2,000 and with an $11,000 income tax bill, as well as $6,800 property tax bill, all for us to pay. Needless to say, we are without money or any credit.

he kept me in a position for a very long length of time while trying to convince me of how horrible i am and that i just need to die he asked me several times if i was afraid and i started to panic he pulled out his knife that he kept around his leg and he brought it to my neck

I thought I would never see my boys again. I just told him to end this craziness, and he for some reason pulled back. I didn't tell the police because I know that they can't protect me from him. I know he will be back. He's now attempting to try to make me look like the bad guy here, with these untrue charges of battery against him and against his 17-year-old girlfriend.

the sick thing is i really think that they're enjoying this over the summer they went out of their way to roller blade right in front of my home they drove by and they stopped for long lengths of time in front of the house childish things like his girlfriend flipping me off if i was out front with my kids while driving by

At the present time, my children have been in a program at school called Rainbows in an effort to repair some of the damage that Drew and his girlfriend created. One of which, Drew falsely arrested me in front of my children with my face in the grass and called me a criminal for hitting his girlfriend, which didn't happen.

instead she called me a bunch of inappropriate names in front of my children so i felt it was necessary to get them back in the house away from this when i ran to the truck it being very high up i noticed stacy his girlfriend taping me with the stolen camera that drew took from our home

I attempted to take the camera and my next goal was to return to my home with my children. But I was thrown to the ground and I was treated like an outlaw and I was booked and arrested for no reason. And my wrist was sprained from when I was being thrown to the ground and held down by Drew, who was not on duty at the time. While this was happening, my children were being held against their will by Stacey while she told them to sit down and be quiet."

And it went on to say a few more things before finally ending with,

and also will take any lie detector test on the statement I filed against him. I really feel Drew is a loose cannon. He's out on the streets of Bolingbroke patrolling and just taking the law into his own hands. I haven't received help from the police here, and I'm asking for your help now, all before it's too late. I really hope that by filing this charge, it might stop him from trying to hurt us.

Now, if that doesn't send a shiver down your spine, I don't know what to tell you because when I first read this, my immediate thought was this woman knew she was in trouble.

She knew she was in danger. She knew that her kids were potentially in danger. She was trying to find any possible resource to help her, and nobody was helping her. Nobody was stepping up. And on top of this, remember, she had those 18 calls, the protective order against him, where he just kept showing up, and it was almost as though he was completely untouchable because he was a police officer.

And now look where we are. You have your current wife missing, a previous one dead, two more previous wives who say you have a history of controlling behavior and abusive behavior. I mean, it's not looking good for Drew. Now the stories of Drew's controlling behavior and abusive ways, sure, was enough to make him look like a suspect. It was enough for everybody to think there's a big red flag here, something's not adding up.

But those weren't the only things that led him to being named as a suspect in Stacey's disappearance. There was a lot more, and everything was about to unravel. But before we get to that, we are going to hear from the final sponsors of today's episode. Okay, so we have this whole checkered past with Drew, but there was a lot more to the story than anybody realized. See, Stacey's friends and family had actually been helping the police piece together a timeline of the day that she went missing.

One of those friends had said that she had last talked to Stacey at 10:15 that morning. She had talked to Stacey about painting the house, and Stacey said that she would be going over later. Now, it seemed like that was the last time that anybody had talked to her. Stacey's neighbor Sharon said that she had left for the grocery store around 9:40 a.m. that morning. When she left, both of the Petersons' cars were in the driveway, though. And when she came back, just a little before noon, she only saw one car.

Apparently, she called over to the house to offer the kids a little bit of candy, and when she was on that phone call, Drew said that Stacey had gone to go visit her grandpa, and that she wasn't home. Then, about an hour after that phone call, Drew brought the kids over to Sharon's house, and then he said that he had to go run an errand, and he left for about 15 minutes.

Later that night, after Stacey's sister Cassandra couldn't reach her, she went over to the house around 11 p.m. Drew's oldest son Thomas answered the door, and he said that he was watching the other kids because his dad went out to go look for Stacey after, quote, they got into a fight. But then when Cassandra called Drew, he told her he was home now,

and that he had gone out to look for stacy earlier but remember cassandra she was right around the corner and she knew that he wasn't home and she knew that he was lying why are you lying what reason do you have for lying if you're innocent and if you're not involved in this

So shortly after that, Cassandra went to the Downers Grove Police Department to file a missing persons report. They referred her out to the Bowling Brook Police Department, since that's where they lived. She ended up getting there around 1 a.m. But then by 2.30 a.m., Drew was already saying that Stacy had left him, that she took that money, that she went to the airport, that she called him, all of those things. So that's when her sister Cassandra went to the Illinois State Police for more help.

But here's something else, not only the timeline, which is weird, but another really weird thing that stands out. Drew was supposed to be working that night. His shift was scheduled to start at 5:00 PM, but just a few hours before, he called in to request the day off.

So to summarize, because I know we just went over a lot, we've got Stacey, who was last heard from at 10.15 a.m., Drew then leaving to go run an errand, then Drew calling out of work, and then he's gone out looking for her, but she happened to just go and get on a plane. I mean, it wasn't making any sense. Not to mention, there is absolutely zero record of her ever getting on a plane that day. So all of these pieces of information, they're just not adding up, right? It looks like a cover-up.

However, would there be any proof? Would there be any solid evidence to prove where Stacey had gone, where she was, who was responsible, or what really happened? And the shady timeline that wasn't really making sense, and the lies and the excuses, it wasn't even the biggest thing that police had that made them think that Drew was a suspect.

See, a couple of days after Stacey went missing, police got word that Drew's stepbrother Tom was in the hospital after ODing. This was apparently after he had attempted to take his own life. And not only that, but the police had said that Tom might have had some critical information. So they went and they met with Tom and they offered him full immunity to tell them everything, anything that he knew.

And Tom did share some information. According to Tom, he helped his brother Drew carry a blue barrel out of the house on the night that Stacey went missing. A blue barrel, like a big drum, one of those big, like, water drums, gasoline drums,

you know, you know what I'm talking about. Almost like it looks like a mega version of a tin cup, if that makes sense. I don't know how else to explain it. Like almost like a beer keg, but a barrel. I mean, definitely something big enough to fit a body in, certainly, or evidence or anything else like that. Tom also said that a day prior to that, a day prior to removing this drum from Drew's house, which coincidentally was also the day that Stacey went missing, they apparently had a conversation, the two of them, Tom and Drew.

A conversation where Drew talked about Stacey apparently cheating on him. And I guess it seemed like Drew was possibly plotting to kill. Drew had also asked his brother Tom to get a storage unit, but Tom couldn't because he didn't have an ID.

Tom also claims that he never looked inside the barrel, but he claimed that Drew told him to never speak about it and that the barrel was warm to the touch. Tom later said that Drew had also taken him to a park, had handed him a phone, and told him not to answer it before he then walked away. Over the next 45 minutes, the phone rang twice, showing that Stacey was calling the phone.

Apparently, after that night, Tom was so sure that he had just carried Stacy's body in that barrel that he had this complete breakdown, and that's when he tried to kill himself, just because he was overpowered with this immense feeling of grief and guilt. I have no idea what anybody's talking about like that. He says he believes that he helped you dispose of your wife's body. Everything is, uh...

None of that's true. So now not only do you have the timeline, the shady history, his brother Tom, and those damning confessions, but there was also a pastor named Neil that both Stacy and Drew knew and had done counseling with.

Now, Neal happened to be serving on the grand jury right after Stacey went missing. During those hearings, which were not related to Stacey, Drew's name was brought up. And Neal made such a scene that the prosecutor, James Glasgow, ended up talking with him out in the hall. Neal told James that about four months before Stacey went missing, she had asked him to meet her at a Starbucks.

At that meeting, she had apparently told him that Drew had killed Kathleen, his third wife. Stacey said that on the night that Kathleen had died, Drew came home wearing all black clothing. He also had a duffel bag full of women's clothing, and he threw everything inside the washing machine.

He then told Stacey that the police would be there soon and that if she said what he told her to say, it would be the perfect crime. So now, after Stacey had gone missing, Neil was convinced that Drew had of course been the one to make her disappear. Now remember

when I said that Drew was pretty brazen with reporters? This was as all of this information was coming out, guys. So you would think that with all of this stuff coming out, Drew would maybe pause, maybe reflect, maybe figure out how to stay out of the light and strategize how to prove his innocence. I

Instead of that, Drew handed in his resignation at work, and then he took what some would maybe consider a full-time job campaigning, talking to the media, and just honestly making an utter fool out of himself. It seemed like he would talk to just about anybody who would listen. He denied anything to do with what anybody would ask, what anybody would say, and it kind of just seemed like he wanted to hear himself talk. At one point, he said that Stacey fell into a very deep depression after her sister Tina died of cancer.

He said that after that, Stacey would regularly ask him for a divorce. And according to him, he said it was all based on her menstrual cycle. Tell me you don't know what it's like being a woman with a period without telling me you don't know what it's like being a woman with a period. Because you're not doing that just because of your menstrual cycle. But listen. This is the first time you've actually laid out a timeline of the events of the day that Stacey disappeared and...

As a police officer, it seems odd maybe to most people that you wouldn't have told that to police already. Why in the book is the first time you're laying that out? It was laid out to the police, as it is in the book. Are you not being as specific as you are being in the book? No, it's pretty much the same as it is in the book. What was your reaction to the book? I'm looking at it that they're pretty much focusing more on the negative than on the positive.

Well, let's talk about the lie detector test, because I think that was the big story to come out of this book. Three questions came back deceptive. One of them, I think, was the last time you saw her, if you know her whereabouts, and whether something about a call about Stacey saying she was leaving you. As a police officer, how would you explain that it was considered deceptive? I really can't.

I've been familiar with lie detector tests, you know, all my career, but why I answered truthfully, but why they came back deceptive, I can't even answer for that. People might see your demeanor going on talk shows, talking about this so much. It might just come off to people as seem like, well, I'll talk about it, but I'm not going to get more actively involved in searching for Stacey. Do you see a juxtaposition there that might not sit well with people, or do you not care? Well, we're pretty much been responsive.

in our interviews, you know, something comes out from somebody and we'll respond to it, you know, and we figure we pretty much need to do that. Basically being tried by the media. Correct me if I'm wrong on the timing of this, but Kathleen Savio died during divorce negotiations and Stacey disappeared

After talking about leaving you, is that a coincidence or do I have the timing wrong? How do you address that, what seems like an eerie coincidence to most people? It is an eerie coincidence. Kathy and I had what was called a bifurcated divorce. And we were legally divorced and free to marry others, but the property still hasn't been settled. And she died during that time. With Stacy, the divorce thing was...

She would ask for a divorce once in a while, and the next day she'd be loving me again. So I really didn't put a lot of weight in what she was saying about a divorce. So it's an eerie coincidence. Were either of those relationships ever violent?

Yes. How so? Well, basically Kathleen was a very violent person, but I was never violent towards them. How concerned are you with some of the things that came out in the media regarding, there was the story of the Blue Barrel and then there was the story of the former friends of yours who had many things to say? Wearing the wire. What are your thoughts about how the investigation has progressed? Well, I think all the people who are pretending to be my friends that come out, I think they're all financially motivated.

So, regarding the timeline, what is the time? Where were you that day? Which, on... On the day that Stacey disappeared. What's the story of that day? It's a complex timeline. I know. Can you make it simple? Basically, I came home from work, or worked midnights. I was a watch commander for the police department, and I came home...

I talked with Stacy briefly about what she was going to do for the day, and when I woke up, she was gone. I spent the day with the kids, and I got a call about 9 o'clock that night that she was leaving me. Do you think Stacy would have left her kids? I'm finding that real hard to swallow.

But it happens. Her mother herself, Stacy's mother, left the family in a similar situation. And Stacy talked a lot of times. We were looking out in Arizona and California for homes out there because Stacy wanted to get away from her family, much like her aunt in California did. But to leave the kids like this, I'm having a tough time with it, but I believe it's possible.

What would you say to Stacey, your fourth wife? Come home. Stacey loves male attention. She could be... Ran off with a guy? Ran off with a guy and she could be dancing somewhere. I don't know. Honestly, he was just a complete, total douchebag. He was also a regular guest on a radio show and, and get this, they even tried to launch a contest to win a date with him. I'll do a dating game with you.

Drew? It's up to you, man. I don't know. Ask the lawyer. Yeah, why not? Yes, to win a date with Drew. Drew Peterson is live with us now outside his home in Bolingbrook, Illinois. Drew, is the dating game going to happen? No. Hi, Shepard. How you doing? It looks like it's not going to happen. The radio station chickened out. What was the thinking behind that? Just a comedy bit we were going to do, and...

It was all going to be in good nature. And I guess the next thing they were setting up contestants for me and I guess they got such heat over it that they chickened out. How do you manage to stay so upbeat given the fact that your wife's been missing for three months? Oh, it's just, you know, you do what you can. You know, I'm not going to go hide in a corner and cry about it. You know, it's just like I personally grieve over it.

But I do that all on my own. How has this affected your children?

Oh, they're pretty upset, but I guess that's not what we were going to talk about today. No, no, I meant the dating part of it all. The neighbors said that they saw you carrying out a big blue barrel that would be big enough. Again, Shepard, that's not what we agreed to talk about. Oh, I didn't agree to any restrictions on conversation. I would never do that. I just wonder what... Okay, well, then I guess I've got to walk away. Have a good day, Mr. Shepard. It was nice talking to you.

Well, he'll talk about the dating game, but he won't talk about the fact that the neighbors say they saw him with a large 55-gallon blue barrel carrying it out with someone else.

and shortly after his wife went missing. Now, while Drew was out making jokes and making light of everything, law enforcement worked very hard behind the scenes to find Stacey, but also worked very hard to figure out what truly happened to Kathleen. After her body was exhumed, two separate autopsies were performed, one by a pathologist that her family hired and another done by Will County.

And get this, both of those autopsies came back with the same answer. Her manner of death was believed to be a homicide. So finally, on May 7, 2009, police were able to arrest Drew. Former Bolingbroke police officer Drew Peterson now under arrest. Peterson was arrested in a traffic stop near his Bolingbroke home. And they charged him with the murder of Kathleen.

The trial started three years later, and the prosecution was taking a little bit different of an approach than usual. Now unfortunately, neither Kathleen or Stacy could be there to testify. So they were going to have to use the accounts that they had all told other people, everything that was considered to be a little bit of hearsay.

So because of this, they had to get special permission to do it by the judge. And people were really concerned if it would even go well. But, I mean, all they could do in this moment was try. The prosecution brought in many witnesses to share things that they had all seen or heard. Now, while the trial was for the murder of Kathleen, they were able to talk about Stacey.

Drew's defense was dead set on the fact that he didn't do it, that there was no DNA evidence, no signs of forced entry, or any other physical evidence to prove it. And on top of that, remember, Stacey had corroborated his story that he wasn't even there that weekend, which you would normally think, yes, could be useful, except that in this instance, Drew was literally sitting right next to Stacey when the police were interviewing her.

So why wouldn't she corroborate if she was scared of him? And ultimately, the jury did not buy the defense's story, and Drew was found guilty of murdering Kathleen.

From the family, an emotional, bittersweet celebration. Finally, somebody heard Kathleen cry. Twelve people did the right thing, oh thank God. I know that she got justice in the hands of that cold-blooded killer up there. He was a thug. He would threaten people because he had a gun and a badge. And nobody ever took him on. We took him on now, and he lost. Woo!

and he was sentenced to 38 years. Now, if you thought that with this case and this story, that was as deep as it goes, buckle up. While Drew was in prison, serving time for Kathleen's murder, another inmate came forward with some very concerning information. This inmate said that Drew was trying to hire a hit-to-kill John Glasgow, the prosecutor from the trial.

They wired this inmate, and sure enough, Drew blabbed all about it, not having any clue that he was being recorded. Just a complete moron.

moron. So he ended up being charged for that too, and he was given another 40-year sentence on top of his already 38-year sentence. Since then, he has tried to appeal both cases, but it has just been a total complete bust. I mean, the evidence is clear as day. Now since then, he has done a number of interviews, and he continues to say that he is innocent, that he had nothing to do with Kathleen's murder, that he had nothing to do with Stacey's disappearance, and he actually blames his attorney for his wild on-camera behaviors.

His interviews, guys, literally give me the chills. It is like there is no soul behind his eyes. You're definitely not going to live to 127. That's for sure. So what's the downside of just laying it all out there? What's the downside of just saying it all? What's the downside? I'm not wanting my children to believe that I killed their mothers. I do not want my kids to think that about me. It sounds like

you did do that and you just don't want them to know. No, I didn't do that. I want them to know the truth and believe the truth. Drew, I just asked you what's the downside of just laying it all out there? And the answer would have been there's nothing to lay out. Instead, you said, I don't want my children knowing. No, I don't want them thinking that of me. You see what I just did? I asked you what the downside is of just laying it all out there and being honest. And you said you didn't want your children knowing that. We can sit here in your expert interviewer

and you can manipulate what I'm saying any way you want. I'm not manipulating you. I want to know the truth. I'm saying it's possible. So it's just like my thing is. I'm very guarded now with what I say to you. I think you let your guard down. Well... I think you just said to me, "You're not going to lay it all out there because you don't want your children knowing." I'm not going to say nothing that's going to make my children believe that I killed their mothers. You don't seem to be the kind of person, from the outside looking in,

that wants to be forgotten. You seem to be someone who enjoys the limelight. Nope. Get me out of it. The limelight is what exaggerated everything and got me in here. So you're a different person now? I'm a different person? I'm the same as I always was. Well, that drew Peterson, loved the limelight. Yeah, it's just part of my obnoxiousness. How do you think life has been so unfair to you? If everything's rigged against you, why is that? Why?

People enjoy seeing policemen in trouble. They really do. I was a policeman for 32 years and I've seen a lot of cops get in trouble and people enjoy that. Am I right? So the whole reason for the disaster that has become of your life, sitting here incarcerated until you're 127 years old, is because people don't like police officers?

After we wrapped up the interview, Drew was talking. He kept talking and we kept talking while the crew was getting a few pieces of extra video, some wider shots and side shots. So I just kept asking him questions. And I asked him why he agreed to even meet with me since he knew that I was going to ask tough questions. At least I assumed he did. And he joked, and I quote. I promise.

unless you marry me. I'm making a joke. I will guarantee you that's not going to happen, my friend.

Over the past 16 years, Stacey's sister has never given up searching for her. She is determined to get answers for her sister. She has continuously worked hard to raise money to help in the searches so that she could try to find Stacey. And recently, Cassandra came out and said that she believes that she found Stacey. She thinks that she's found Stacey's remains in a canal in Chicago. Numerous sonar searches, and back in 2007, November 19th in 2007, we found Stacey.

A female body, which was basically my sister. You could see the hair waving, the breasts and her legs. She was becoming buoyant, but not buoyant enough to come to the top of the surface because she was weighed down. She was at that location for three days. State police were notified, and they...

didn't do anything. They were sent everything, they had the coordinates, and then me and my team, we were threatened to be arrested if we acted on anything. And after the third day, she was gone, and we just went on continuing searching. Then the spring of 2008, we expanded and continued, and we found her down the canal,

And you could see decomp and the flesh going. You can actually see a fish above her body. She still had flesh, but she lost her eyes and her feet were gone. It was kind of turning skeletal. Informed the state police. Again, nothing. I think I fought them for like a year. And then they just went out and did a blind dive one day and didn't even like re-sonar it.

Then, the technology keeps getting better and better, and I looked for the best of the best, and that's when I found the one and only Sonar ROV and had it brought in from Alaska, and that's what we got.

Yeah, sorry to interrupt you. I mean, I'm just looking at the images, Cassandra, and the fact that you had to find this sonar RV from Alaska to come down and that you were able to locate these remains, it is unbelievable. And I don't understand. I'm just trying to understand, like, why...

What are the police doing? If you were able to locate the skull and other bones and you know where they are, I would think there'd be a dive team in the water tonight going to collect the remains. What is going on? So basically we had the ROV sitting on top, just in that position, sitting on the bottom. And I had called state police. I had called the state's attorney. They came out. They seen it. I even set up a tent because it was cold out.

And we showed them everything, and then we just stood there, and they just said, well, you expect us to come out tonight or right now? And I just get pushed back. Then I had to call them every day. Then I called the FBI, and finally I got the FBI to come in. Three months later, after I was on that, and they just kind of did a blind dive and floated around. I have that on video. They were all just floating on the top of the water the whole time. And then when I was there, they didn't even talk to me, and they treat me like a criminal. So...

And then at the end, they told me that that area is cleared. So that area is cleared. Now I'm just trying to get some funds and get that equipment back. And they said it's clear. So there's no crime scene. I'll walk into state police with her skull in my hand. It's somebody's. It's not, I don't know. It's my sister, but it's definitely somebody's loved one that needs to be coming home. Yeah.

- So they say the area is cleared, but you've got the sonar RV there with the images. I mean, both of those things can't be true. - Unfortunately, Stacey is still currently missing. And most people, including myself, believe that the evidence shows that Drew is the one that made her disappear.

So hopefully they will eventually be able to charge him with her disappearance and likely murder soon, especially if these remains can just get removed and tested. I don't know why it is taking so long and why it is such a process, but hopefully there's a resolution soon. Now I'm sure some of you might also be wondering, well, whatever happened to all of the kids? Well, Drew's oldest son, Stephen, took on the role of raising all of the children.

He has tried to give them as normal of a life as possible, all while his dad Drew acts like just a complete jerk-off, saying that the kids don't need mothers. It is just truly a horrible, horrible case. It has been almost two decades now that Stacey has been missing. No answers, no recovery, no accountability or justice. So not only did I want to resurface this case because so many of you hadn't heard of it and you didn't know all of the nuances,

But we need to advocate for Cassandra, for Stacey's sister, because people, if they're not taking her seriously and removing these remains, what if it is Stacey? And Cassandra really believes that it is. That could be closure right there. That could be charges. That could be something. And nothing is happening with that. So that's why it's so important to talk about these cases existing, old, ongoing, current, all of the things, because...

Sometimes you just need people to have this new sense of interest in a case so that hopefully things can start to move and that hopefully answers can be found and justice can be served and people are held accountable. So I'm really hoping that there is a renewed interest in Stacey's case and that her sister and so many others who miss Stacey can finally get some answers.

Let me know what you think about this case. Do you think that Drew is responsible or do you think that it could be somebody else? Let me know. Thank you guys again for tuning into another episode of Serialistly with me, Annie Elise. I appreciate you sticking through. And if you have 30 extra seconds and you're listening on Apple, please leave this podcast a rating and review. Let me know what you like, what you don't like, what you want to hear more of. Because as I've mentioned before, I definitely want to cater this podcast to the content you want to hear.

Alright guys, thanks again and until the next one, be nice, don't kill people. But until then, I am signing off and I will be back on the mic with you on Thursday with an all new exclusive podcast only episode. We do those every single Thursday, but those of you who are watching on YouTube, it's podcast only. So you definitely are going to need to hop over there. Alright guys, thanks again. Talk to you soon. Bye.